Drawing Dead
Fucking cokeheads, Joey thought. If they weren’t half his business, he wouldn’t have nothing to do with them.
    â€œThat’s what the guy said. He said he heard 'em talkin' about it. He said the one guy had a girlfriend up there.”
    â€œWho’s that?” Joey wasn’t tracking. He kept thinking about his red Allante. The way Joey heard it, when the cops start flashing him, Bubby panics and cans it, which in the Allante takes him right up to one twenty, and the next thing, he’s got every cop on the North Side coming at him.
    â€œCatfish.”
    â€œCatfish?” Sounded like one of his customers. The guys he sold cars to all had goofy names—Dogboy, Tacoumba, Mohammed. Or Bubby. Fucking Bubby, gets himself boxed in at the tollway entrance, gets the shit beat out of him, which he deserved by all accounts, and then they find a quarter pound of coke in the gym bag on the passenger seat. Of course, Bubby says he never saw it before. Shit. With a little luck, Joey might get the Allante back from the cops in three months. Even worse, Bubby would be spending his next decade in the joint instead of paying cash for a new-color Caddy every time he moved a few kilos.
    â€œSo now you want I should go up there?” Freddy asked again.
    Joey forced his mind to the business at hand, the comic book guys. Unfinished business. A few weeks back, when Freddy found out that they had fled to Minnesota, Joey decided that he had more important jobs for Freddy right here at home. As much as he’d wanted to take care of the comic book thing, sending Freddy all the way up to Minnesota seemed like a lot of trouble. Besides, he’d had a few large and uncertain payments coming due, and Freddy’s presence had ensured their prompt receipt. Also, Jimmy Spencer, his chop-shop manager, had a guy on a six-to-nine-month state-funded vacation, and he had needed an extra hand in the shop. But two weeks of Freddy Wisnesky was more than enough for Spence, and he’d sent him back to Joey with a note: “No thanks. I want my cars taken apart like that, I’ll get a guy in here with a backhoe.”
    So now Freddy needed something to do. It wasn’t like you could tell him to go hang out until needed. A guy like Freddy had to be kept busy, or he’d get in some kind of trouble. The comic book guys were perfect. What the hell, Joey thought, it would get Freddy out of his hair for a while, and it would take care of that stabbing sensation he got in his stomach every time he thought about the Stasis Shields. The memory of opening the phony comic book up, Chrissy sitting right there watching, made his veins bulge. Now was the time.
    â€œYou want to go to Minneapolis? Why the fuck not? Isn’t that what I told you before? Didn’t I tell you to find those guys?”
    â€œUh-huh.”
    â€œThen do like I told you. I don’t care if you have to go to fucking Timbuktu.”
    â€œWhat car you want me to take?”
    â€œTake whatever you want. Wait a minute. Don’t take an Allante, f'chrissake. Take something I can afford to lose. You like convertibles?”
    â€œSure.”
    â€œGo over to Spence’s shop and tell him to give you the blue ragtop we just took from Ohio. Have him throw on a new set of plates. Needs a muffler, but it ought to get you to Minneapolis. Okay?”
    â€œOkay. Can I have some money?”
    â€œEverybody wants money. Didn’t I give you some money a week ago? My fucking wife wants money. My squeeze wants money. The cops want money. My lawyers want money.” He swept the shattered remains of the pencil off his desk. “How much money you want?”
    Freddy shrugged. “Whatever you think I’ll need, Mister C.” Mathematical reasoning ability was not Freddy’s strongest asset.
    Joey Cadillac glared at Freddy. How do you argue with a guy like that? He unlocked a desk drawer and pulled out two packs of twenties.

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